Jirga in Mardan gives 72 hours ultimatum to police

MARDAN: The district government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s (KP) city Mardan has summoned an All Party Conference (APC) on Friday over the brutal rape and murder of a four-year-old girl.

According to details, the jirga of elders in the area has taken action by giving the government an ultimatum of 72 hours to arrest the culprits and launch an investigation against them.

Earlier, police personnel arrested as many as 20 suspicious people in a case pertaining to strangling a four-year-old child to death after raping her in Mardan.

The girl’s body was found three days ago after which her medical test was conducted that confirmed rape. However, her blood sample was also sent to a forensic laboratory in Lahore for further verification.

Mardan DPO said that a Joint Investigation Team (JIT) has been formed to probe the case under his supervision. He said that a few people have been taken into custody while geo-fencing of the area is also underway.

Meanwhile, Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari strongly condemned the mishap and declared it a horrible crime. He demanded the authorities provide justice to the bereaved family.

Mardan District Nazim Himayatullah Mayar stated that the child was murdered after being raped after the girl was found dead in Mardan’s Gujar Garhi area Monday morning. He said that he has seen the postmortem report and it clearly states that the minor was raped.

However, DPO Mardan Mian Saeed negated the claims and said that the girl was strangled to death. He stated that the post-mortem report does not point towards rape.

Mayar alleged that the police are trying their best to hide the postmortem report.

According to the police, the girl had gone missing after she left her house a day earlier. The police have also formed an investigation team to probe the incident.

PM’s adviser Ameer Muqam condemned the incident and said: “The cases against minors have become quite problematic for the entire country.”

Lashing out at the PML-N’s political opponent Imran Khan, he remarked that this incident shows the ‘brilliant’ performance of Imran’s police.

Before this, two innocent girls were killed after being raped in the area of KP Chief Minister Pervaiz Khattak’s constituency.

“Imran’s concept of justice changes in different provinces. His consciousness is awakened only in Punjab while he turns a blind eye towards injustice in KP,” said Muqam.